Astrophysics

New evidence may settle the debate over whether brown dwarfs are super planets or mini stars

Private funding for the Arecibo Observatory—the largest single-dish radio telescope in the world—may be a poison pill

The planet, Kepler 452 b, is likely rocky and orbits in its star’s habitable zone where liquid water can exist

With a $100-million donation, billionaire Yuri Milner plans to revolutionize the astronomical quest to find alien life

The spheres of carbon₆₀ have been found to be responsible for mysterious cosmic-light features

High-resolution images of the icy worlds reveal towering mountains, yawning canyons and perhaps hints of a subsurface ocean

Scientists find that the biggest, brightest bursts of light herald the creation of the universe’s most magnetic objects

Astronomers have discovered more than 800 so-called "ultradiffuse galaxies" that are virtually invisible because they have relatively few stars and are mostly dark matter. Clara Moskowitz reports

A segmented mirror four or five times wider than Hubble's would peer directly at exoplanets

As the legendary space telescope enters its twilight years, astronomers are searching for a replacement, but no one agrees about what it should accomplish

The history of the leap second reveals a curious pattern of decreasing frequency since its adoption 43 years ago

Scientists might have found that an exotic astronomical object may not be so rare after all